Education Bookcast

Jaime Escalante was a Bolivian teacher who came to Los Angeles in the 1960s. After joining the chaotic failing school Garfield High as a mathematics teacher in 1974, he soon began an Advanced Placement Calculus program that grew to an unheard of size for such a disadvantaged community. In 1982, the Educational Testing Service (ETS), which wrote and marked the tests, suspected Garfield High students of cheating. This led to interest from the media and later fame for Escalante as people started to take notice of what was happening at the school. Soon after, the film Stand and Deliver was produced based on Escalante's success up to that point, starring Edward James Olmos in the leading role. However, even this film did not capture the scale of the success at Garfield High, as it came too early. After 1982, the number of students at the school taking AP Calculus continued to climb to stratospheric heights, from 18 in 1982 - already unbelievable to most, hence the media attention - to 33 in 1983, 68 in 1984, and a